the one where joey finds out
by anonfangirling
Summary: JOEY/CHANDLER joey kisses chandler on new years and everything goes floopy. enjoy.


'Somebody kiss me! It's midnight" Chandler shouted, gesturing wildly at his glum cluster of friends in the kitchen. No one looked enthusiastic at the prospect and all remained where they stood. When his gaze landed upon Monica, she shot him a look of disdainful dismissal and turned to Rachel, who muttered something under her breath. Chandler shot them both a glare.

'Somebody kiss me!' he repeated, his voice increasing in volume, 'Somebody kiss me, it's midnight!'

He demand was, once again, received with little more than several sighs and frustrated shrugs. Phoebe had barely even registered he'd spoken and was staring down at the floor in desolation, Monica rubbing her shoulder affectionately, still deep in conversation with Rachel. Chandler gesticulated furiously at them, realising with dismay that he had dumped his only chance at New Years romance when he'd sent Janice home in tears. No, Janice was not his first choice of girlfriend or even his first choice of fling-material, but she'd had lips, hadn't she? She'd been a woman who actually cared enough to pay him even the most fleeting bit of attention and, for reasons he had temporarily forgotten, he'd mercilessly ditched her.

Chandler grumbled something under his breath. He'd hit rock bottom - again. Well, to be precise, he'd hit rock bottom about three hours after being born, but that was beside the point and not something he needed to dwell on at that particular moment.

He sighed and pulled his hands from where they had automatically settled in his pockets. 'It is almost one minute past midnight and I have still not been kissed.' he declared with exaggerated misery. 'Somebody kiss me! Somebody kiss me!'

Rachel looked at him with a waspish glare.

'Chandler-' Monica started, but Chandler didn't hear the rest of her sentence because hands had seized either side of his face and yanked him forwards. Lips were pressed over his mouth that kissed him with a ferocity that almost left him bruised and he felt something kick violently in his chest as though someone had punched him.

Chandler blinked in shock and when his eyes opened, he saw that the face pressed against his own belonged to Joey. Violent panic turned Chandler's muscles to boiling marble and for a moment he forgot how to breathe as his friends lips closed around his own, hot and full and startlingly soft - something that Chandler vainly pretended he didn't notice.

The strange act of passion lasted less than half a second, but when Joey's lips and hands vacated his face, it left Chandler reeling, sweat beginning to blossom on his forehead. He leant against the blue counter behind him, forcing his fingernails into the brightly coloured wood to prevent his entire body from crumpling like an old newspaper.

'There,' Joey said matter of factly. He'd dropped his hands to his side and was staring at the floor, forehead creased and an expression of slight bewilderment clinging to his features. Chandler tried to feel disgusted. He wanted to be repulsed, he needed to make some sarcastic comment about how there was _not what he wanted and how Joey should never ever do that again,_ but the lies were buried in his throat and his tongue was refusing to move.

He wrenched his eyes away from Joey - a task that should not have been so difficult - and turned to the rest of his friends, dreading the expressions he would find plastered on their faces.

The girls were failing to conceal their mirth and Ross was smirking and holding a disposable camera with smug satisfaction. Chandler inwardly groaned. Having his photo taken was never something Chandler enjoyed - in fact it was something he fervently despised - and right then he wished he could rip the camera from Ross's fingers and trample it into Monica's kitchen floor. Perhaps he would have done, if he could move.

Chandler wasn't sure he'd ever felt so uncomfortable.

Joey's hands had long abandoned his cheeks, but they somehow still seared with the echo of his friends fingertips and Chandler realised that he was now sweating profusely, his clothes smeared to his body like a second layer of skin. He hoped, despairingly, that his forehead hadn't grown too obviously wet and that his cheeks weren't the awful red colour he knew they would be.

'Well that shut you up,' Monica smirked, her eyebrows raised. 'I guess that's what you get for inviting Janice.'

Chandler shot her a mirthless grimace.

Rachel proceeded to cackle in a poor imitation of Janice's machine gun laughter, much to the delight of the others, and Chandler groaned, prizing himself up from where he was slumped against the countertop.

He realised that Joey hadn't said anything since the incident - Chandler couldn't quite bring himself to call it a _kiss,_ even in his own head - and was still stood, looking rather forlorn, gazing at the floorboards. Chandler had seen this expression many times before - usually when Joey was attempting a crossword puzzle or trying to figure out how much money he owed for the rent - and found himself wishing he knew what Joey was thinking.

'You two gonna stay?' Monica's voice sliced through Chandler's tangle of thoughts and he blinked, looking up at her with what he hoped was an expression of nonchalant indifference.

Joey finally looked up, 'You know, Mon, I'm kinda beat,' he said, stuttering slightly and running a hand through his hair.

'Yeah,' Chandler blurted, 'me too,'

Joey turned to look at him, but his eyes fell short of Chandlers and rested, Chandler realised with a jolt, on his lips.

'All that kissin' take it out of you, huh?' Phoebe giggled, tugging at a stray strand of hair and placing it vaguely between her teeth.

Chandler forced himself to smile, but it appeared on his face as something that could easily be misconstrued as a look of extreme pain. A joke fell flat on his lips and he let his eyes fall to the floor.

'G'night, lover boys,' Rachel purred and Monica snorted into her hand.

Chandler followed Joey through the door into their apartment and closed it quietly behind him. When he fumbled with the lock, he realised his hands were shaking. It could have been the large quantity of alcohol in Chandler's bloodstream or perhaps he was coming down with something - whatever it was, it had turned his stomach to a squirming, acidic bundle of nausea. Pain was beginning to creep behind his eyes as well, as though someone had shoved a fork into each of his temples and was stirring with reckless abandon.

He stumbled in what he hoped was the direction of the kitchen - his eyes were fixed on the floor - and shoved a glass under cold water.

'Hey, man, look, I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable or anythin' back there,'

Startled, Chandler turned stiffly to face Joey. He had been too awash with alcohol and shock to notice Joey's approach, and now that they were face to face, the pain behind his eyes became almost blinding.

'Don't worry about it,' Chandler almost choked on his words.

Joey nodded vaguely and shuffled his feet. 'Oh,'

'I mean - I mean it was nice,' Chandler blurted and Joey's eyes widened considerably. 'Oh god - no, no, I mean it was a nice, you know, gesture and all that.'

'Oh,' Joey said again, except this time there was something hidden beneath his voice that Chandler couldn't quite place. The forlorn expression Joey had worn just minutes earlier had returned and his eyes were, once more, stitched uneasily to the floor.

Chandler's insides were on fire and he wasn't sure how to stifle the flames. Both men stood in silence for several seconds, before Joey muttered something that sounded like 'g' _night'_ and retreated silently to his room.

Chandler wasn't sure he could move. The exchange had buckled his feet to the floorboards and clogged his airways with something strange and unfamiliar, through which it was very difficult to breathe.

Since that goddamn kiss, everything had gained the quality of a dream - even the air around him felt surreal and alien, as though he had been dropped in some sick copy of reality where nothing quite made sense - a reality where Chandler and Joey kissed. The world felt wrong - Chandler felt wrong; in fact, he felt absolutely horrendous.

It took several minutes for his heart rate to decelerate to something that didn't foreshadow a stroke, and even then, Chandler was reluctant to even take one step, let alone stumble all the way to his bed.

Sleep seemed so unreachable, and laying in the dark with only his thoughts to accompany him was not a concept he could even think about without feeling bile rush to his throat. So, with the strongest alcohol he could find - and a packet of cigarettes he'd hidden under the sofa - Chandler collapsed into a chair and let his world disintegrate.

Vodka began to chip at his thoughts - the very thoughts he had been pushing away for god knows how long: the monster in his head that had so violently resurfaced when Joey had kissed him. Every so often something like this happened - there would be a hug that lasted for a little too long, or eye contact that sent Chandler's insides rattling down into his legs and then, that awful parasite in his head would make its appearance. Most of the time, he was able to shove it into the back of his mind and lock it there, but this was before Joey had kissed him. This time, the parasite was not so malleable and Chandler was finding it very difficult to eliminate it.

Of course, allowing himself to acknowledge it would be a betrayal - largely to himself, but he couldn't imagine that everyone else would be so willing to jump on board with his acceptance either.

Chandler winced as the idea crossed his mind - the idea of revealing the person beneath the jokes and the armour in which he had entangled himself. He flipped open the box of cigarettes and stuck one shakily between his lips, flicking his lighter and inhaling sharply, letting the hot stink of tobacco encircle him and flood his mouth with poisonous warmth.

It was a relief, for a little, to feel the familiar burn in his lungs and the little paper tube in his fingers. But then he remembered Joey's lips and how no amount of cigarettes and no amount of vodka would ever equal them.

Daylight ripped into Chandler's eyelids like some sort of chemical weapon and he groaned, rolling slightly so that the glare was partially neutralised by the black leather of his recliner.

Everything hurt.

Something was stabbing him repeatedly in the head and his stomach had dissolved into neat alcohol - even his throat was burning and every muscle in his body seemed to weigh one hundred pounds more than it had the night before.

A soft clunk settled into the silence and Chandler jumped upright in his chair as footsteps padded across the carpet towards him. Garish light gouged into his retinas and he blinked, his eyes watery and foggy and unwilling to be exposed to anything other than pitch black. He could see a smudgy black figure amongst the light that leaked through the curtains like poison - it took him a moment before he realised it was Joey.

'Jesus, Chandler!' His voice was riddled with alarm, and something that Chandler decided was dismay.

'What?' Chandler swallowed something that tasted like stale tobacco and felt like sulphuric acid. 'What's going on?'

'What the hell are you doin'?' Joey yelped, incredulous, stepping over something Chandler couldn't see and crouching to examine it. 'Man, you drank it all?'

Joey lifted and waved an empty bottle perilously close to Chandler's face and he closed his eyes, wishing both the bottle and Joey would disappear.

'Dude, what happened?'

Chandler pushed himself up on hands and arms that felt like lead, trying to force himself to focus on anything but Joey. He blanched, sick with recollection as he absorbed the damage before him. Cigarette butts were scattered in a ghastly halo around the recliner on which he sat, and several more bottles were flung carelessly next to them - one of them Chandler didn't even remember drinking but the building feeling of nausea told him that he most certainly had.

He tried to form words to explain himself and the wreckage among which he sat, but his tongue sat like a slug in his mouth and bile was burning the back of his throat with incessant determination. Half a second later, he found himself diving at the bathroom.

He'd thrown up at least half a bottle of vodka before Joey appeared behind him with a towel, albeit a slightly soggy one, and a glass of tepid water.

'Here,'

Chandler felt a hand on his back - the same hand that had gripped his face the night before - and an arm slid awkwardly around his shoulders. Chandler almost choked on his own tongue and turned uncomfortably to face his friend.

'Seriously, man, you alright?' Joey's voice was so soft and raw that Chandler had to stop himself from melting into the tiles. Shame and disgust with himself rattled up his throat like a tsunami and it was all he could do to keep it from rushing into the toilet bowl.

'Yeah,' Chandler sputtered. Embarrassment was the next emotion to join the churning wreckage of his thoughts and he swallowed with an anxious brutality.

'Drink,' Joey said and before Chandler could argue, Joey had pressed the slippery glass up against his lips. The water tasted of his own self hatred and Chandler almost gagged. Nausea was still holding him to the floor but he had to get out, even if he spent the whole day throwing up in the middle of Manhattan, at least it would mean that Joey took his stupid hands away and he could pretend that everything was okay.

'Dude, what are you doin'?'

Chandler had scrambled from the toilet bowl and ripped himself away from Joey's arm. 'I'm going to work,' he muttered and tried to force his legs into motion.

'It's a Saturday?' Joey was behind him, voice riddled with confusion and something that almost sounded like _hurt. '_ What is _up_ with you today?'

Chandler refused to turn around and began grappling with the door handle, but his hands were so slippery with sweat he couldn't grip it properly. 'Nothing, I'm fine.' his voice came out a little snappier than he had intended and he could almost feel Joey's expression of hurt and surprise.

'Jus' go back to bed, man,' Joey retorted and Chandler heard his footsteps retreat and a door slam.

Chandler let himself slide against the door. Oh how badly he wanted to tell Joey what was wrong, but he knew it would be the equivalent of taking a crowbar and wrenching their friendship apart until it lay in pieces on the floor. They had lived together for three years and it had been one thousand and ninety five days of aching shame for Chandler. It had been something he could suppress before Joey arrived, but that stupidly beautiful Italian had gouged himself a permanent residence within Chandler's head and every single time they shared a hug, every single time they spent time together, it ripped Chandler's heart into thousands of excruciating pieces. That fucking kiss had just pushed him over the edge and his insides were burning as though he'd drenched them in oil and lit a match. He'd given up telling himself it was purely just the effects of the alcohol.

In a way, Chandler had always thought that everyone already knew that his romantic interests were settled in a very grey area. He'd had a _quality,_ they'd told him, and it had felt as though they had gouged a hole in his stomach and ripped out the contents. If they ever discovered the tangle of guilt, lust and misery that Chandler reserved specifically for his roommate, he wasn't sure any of them would ever regard him in the same light ever again - especially not Joey.

People often mistook them for a couple, however, and that had almost become a running joke within their friendship group - a joke that filled Chandler's head with an instantaneous migraine and his stomach with unbearable nausea. Often he'd wondered how Joey felt about the whole debacle. If he ever unearthed the answer, he was convinced that it would tear him apart.

Limbs on fire, Chandler wrenched himself upright and downed water until the taste of vomit became just footprints on his tongue.

It took two and a half hours to remove the ash stains from the carpet and scrub the smell from the air with a bottle of air freshener that Chandler found under the sink. The smell of pine and lemon was overtaken, however, when Chandler found himself lighting another cigarette and taking the biggest drag he could, letting his lungs simmer and his heart rate begin to settle as he inhaled his way through the little white tube. He was grateful for the lack of interruptions - neither Monica or Rachel had appeared from across the hall; he assumed they were both in bed, presumably hungover - Phoebe and Ross too, for which he was extraordinarily thankful. The usual earful regarding his smoking habit was not something he ever enjoyed and hearing it today would push him over the edge.

Joey still hadn't emerged, which was unusual for a Saturday morning and it sent another rush of guilt into Chandler's throat. _Why in hell's name did he have to snap at him?_ Nausea began to creep back into his stomach and he breathed deeply, the air smokey and stagnant in his lungs. Indecisive and ashamed, Chandler found himself slinking toward Joey's bedroom door and hovering there, his ear almost touching the wood as he listened.

Silence impregnated the room behind and Chandler squeezed his eyes shut. _He'd messed everything up._ He was sure that Monica would instruct him to take the first step - to apologise first, but this was not a normal day and certainly not one of their typical arguments. Joey probably didn't even understand why they had fallen out in the first place and it was hardly as though Chandler could tell him anything even close to the truth.

It was then that something hit Chandler solidly in the cheekbone and he stumbled back in surprise as Joey's door swung open.

A frown pulled at the edges of Joey's face and his lips were parted slightly, hair falling limply over his forehead, still licked with the gel he'd worn the night before.

Chandler opened his mouth to say something but his throat had closed and a jagged lump was forming in the back of his mouth as he regarded his friend, standing there in disarray. He swallowed a flood of indecorous thoughts and tried to meet Joey's eyes with his own.

'Hey,' Joey muttered, his brow furrowed.

'Joe, listen -' Chandler started, but Joey pushed past him and strode towards the fridge with cold indifference.

'I don't wanna hear it,' Joey's voice sliced through the tension with frigid disdain. Chandler felt as though he were suffering from a body-wide third degree burn.

'Joey, please-'

Joey swivelled as Chandler approached him, a bottle of milk clenched in his fingers. 'You been actin' weird since the party and if you're gonna say anythin' at all, you're gonna tell me why, cus' it's real stupid, Chandler.'

Chandler felt his muscles constrict and the lump in his throat became a concrete brick. 'I can't.'

'Is this about your whole fear-of-being-gay crap?' Joey snapped, slamming the bottle of milk on the countertop. 'So I kissed you, big deal, man! Jus' cus your dad ran out on you and dresses like a chick, don't mean that you can act like some twat every time you're uncomfortable!'

Chandler solidified, his entire body fractured and his eyes beginning to burn with the promise of tears. He blinked profusely, trying to force the building flood back behind clumsy barriers. Yes, he probably wouldn't seem any more pathetic if he did cry, but good god was he going to do his damn best to not let that happen.

'Y'know, you actin' like a royal prick actually hurts people sometimes,' Joey shouted. Chandler winced and shoved his hand into his pocket, tightening his fingers around the box of cigarettes that resided there. No, so they wouldn't soften the blow right now, but he was yearning for the taste of tobacco and the tender burn in his lungs - at least that would make this situation more bearable.

'Y'know, what if I was gay?' Joey yelled, throwing his hands in the air and gesturing furiously. 'Would you hate me too?'

'I don't hate gay people, Joe!' Chandler croaked. His voice emerged pathetic and mangled from his throat and cracked open mid-sentence. He ran a hand through his hair, scraping his scalp with his fingernails as he did so, wishing he could tear into his head and cut off the roaring blowout of thoughts that were stinging his eyes and sending tremors through his veins. 'I am one.'

The words flung themselves from Chandler's lips before he could stop them and he felt his blood turn to frost. He could feel Joey's eyes transfixed on him and the air was becoming almost unbreathable - he could choke at any second and his lungs were going to collapse; he almost hoped that they would, a slow and painful death would be less agonising than this.

It was out. He had admitted the truth he had promised himself he would never expose, the monster he had desperately buried in a shameful fortress at the back of his mind; and now it was free, gouging and clawing at the air between them with gloating cruelty.

Chandler couldn't move, he couldn't breathe, he couldn't speak, he just stared into nothing, wishing the silence would gouge out his eyes so he wouldn't have to look at Joey.

Joey was the first to speak.

'Y-you're what?'

Chandler gulped and suddenly all the air that had abandoned him came streaming into his lungs like water. It was as though someone had yanked a noose around his throat and was tugging on it, his airways closing up and his skin burning like paper.

'I- I can't-' Chandler's voice was trembling and before he could continue, his words split into shards on his tongue and he felt the water behind his eyes begin to break through. He shoved his hands over his face and fell heavily against the countertop, dissolving into raw, coarse despair, shaking and convulsing, unable to stop the tears that were wrenching themselves from his eyes. Strength and judgement had deserted him and he was sobbing with reckless abandon, shivering into his hands and producing the ugliest of sounds as he let himself break into pieces.

Hands were suddenly clamped around him and he felt the familiar warmth of Joey's fingertips either side of his face and suddenly he was giddy, his insides twisting and his body limp as lips pressed to his forehead.

'Chandler,' Joey mumbled against Chandler's temple. 'It's okay,'

And then Joey's mouth was pressed against his face, kissing the salt water from his skin as he prized away Chandler's hands, revealing the shattered face beneath.

Chandler's head was spinning, dizziness had enveloped him and his brain had turned to boiling fog. 'W-what?' he stumbled over the word as though he had never spoken it before.

Joey's hands slid to Chandler's waist and he pulled away slightly, eyes ignited with something strange and unfamiliar. 'You can be pretty damn stupid sometimes, y'know that?' Joey murmured.

He was so close that Chandler could feel the heat of his breath against his face and he felt his cheeks glow a hot scarlet.

'Gods sake, Chandler, you're acting as though you've jus' confessed to killing your mother or somethin',' Joey almost chuckled, a smile pulling at the corners of his mouth. 'An' anyway, I guess on some level,' he gestured vaguely, briefly removing his hand from Chandler's side, 'I kinda already knew, but I jus' never really believed it, you know?'

Words abandoned Chandler and all he could do was stand there, letting the burn of Joey's fingertips eat into his the skin under his shirt. Joey's eyes were still fixed on his, but Chandler couldn't prize his gaze from the small amount of linoleum between them - he wasn't sure he wanted to see the expression on Joey's face.

Something clicked metallically behind them and Chandler realised with a hot flush of adrenalin that someone was opening the door. Joey's hands deserted his waist and he leapt back from Chandler, his eyes flickering over the floor and his fingers running through his hair as he turned away.

'Hey, you guys!' Phoebe emerged from behind the door, a bag slung over her elbow and some sort of pencil jammed in the bun at the back of her head. Her eyes danced deftly over the two men and Chandler felt her gaze settle on his face, a look of concern creasing her brow. 'Hey Chandler, what's going on? You look kinda weepy.'

Chandler opened his mouth to say something when Joey, much to his relief, rose to his defence.

'He, uh- I made him eat a chilli,' Joey stuttered, gesturing vaguely into the air and, whilst Chandler couldn't see him, he could picture the uncomfortable grin plastered on his friends face.

'Great!' a grin jumped onto Phoebe's face and she deposited her bag on the side table. Chandler felt a rush of relief when she didn't probe any further.

'You guys wanna get some coffee? I need to go buy stamps so, you know, I can write to Minsk,' she declared, the smile fading from her face a little. 'Monica said she'd go with me but I think she's asleep and Rachel's… well, I don't know, I didn't wanna go with her.'

Chandler forced himself to speak. 'Why not, Pheebs?'

Phoebe turned, her necklaces rattling as she did so, and opened the fridge. 'Yeah, I don't know.' she stated matter of factly. 'I don't like shopping with her, she always makes me go into that stupid pottery farm place. It's just, ugh.' she shuddered and retrieved a can of diet soda from the fridge, cracking it open with a violent jerk of her thumb.

Despite himself, Chandler felt himself chuckling. 'Pottery farm, Pheebs?'

Joey turned to him, 'Yeah, it's that place with all the furniture and stuff, you know? Ross always has the catalogue,'

Ordinarily, Chandler would have cracked a joke or made fun of them both, but right then, he found himself basking in the normality of the situation. No, Joey was no longer making eye contact with him and yes, he still felt incredibly shaky and raw, but at least they were having an ordinary conversation about ordinary things, and he was able to think of something other than Joey's fingers on his waist.

Phoebe reached for her bag. 'Are you guys coming?'

Chandler nodded, forcing himself up from where he'd been slumped against the counter. He suddenly felt very heavy and unsupported and had to clutch the side of the countertop to stop himself from falling. Secondhand alcohol was still swilling and sloshing through his stomach and the back of his throat still scorched with the aftertaste of bile and cigarettes - if he was going anywhere, he was going to need a shower and at least seven pints of coffee before his legs would function normally.

'You guys go on,' he suggested, trying to contrive his features into something that could be perceived as a look of nonchalance.

Joey turned, his eyes slightly widened and his lips parted. He swallowed and slid a hand to his hips. 'You gonna be okay?'

Phoebe followed Joey's gaze and her eyes fluttered over Chandler's face. 'Wow, that chilli really messed you up.' she stated, the corner of her lips pulling up into a slight smirk. 'You're such a girl,' Phoebe giggled and opened the door. 'Come on, Joey.'

Joey hesitated for a moment and his eyes locked with Chandlers. It was a strange, silent communication, a look of solidarity that comforted Chandler, yet also sent rose to his cheeks and a hammer to his chest.

'I'm fine,' Chandler mumbled and nodded towards the door, 'you go, I'll catch up with you later.'

Joey hovered for a few seconds. Chandler found himself wishing silently that Joey would ignore his advice and stay, but he had already grabbed his coat and was slinging it over his shoulders in a way that sent Chandler's chest pounding.

'I'll see ya,' Joey mumbled and followed Phoebe through the door.


End file.
